Seven Things About Jesus (Hebrews 10:1-14)

This sermon was preached on 14/7/2013

The author encourages further his readers by continuing his focus on Jesus in this section of his letter. Later in the chapter he will make some strong demands of them and even issues a warning to them, but he precedes them with wonderful words of encouragement. There is an obvious pastoral lesson here – if we want people to serve Jesus and press on in that service we need to stress again and again what he has done for them, is doing for them, and will yet do for them. This is a reminder that the most powerful stimulus for Christian service is gratitude moved by love for the Saviour. We can look at briefly at seven things he says about Jesus.

1. Why and how did Jesus come into the world?

The author begins this chapter by telling us why Jesus came into this world (v. 5). One reason was the impossibility of the Jewish rituals to deal completely with sin and provide permanent forgiveness (vv. 1-4). Nothing would be achieved in this matter even supposing those sacrifices were to last forever. But they were the best that could be offered by us because they recognised several important truths about God, such as his holiness and his hatred of sin. So we needed a much better sacrifice in order to deal with our sins and Jesus came to provide it.

A second reason was that Jesus came to do the will of his Father, which was written in what Jesus in the language of the Old Testament calls ‘the scroll of the book’ (vv. 5-8). What was this book? I suspect it is the Old Testament. The author does not quote entirely from the Hebrew Old Testament here. In it, the psalmist says that God bored his ears (a reference to the Old Testament custom of a servant showing his willingness to be a slave by allowing his master to bore a hole in his ears through to a doorpost). Here, the author uses ‘a body you have prepared for me’, which is found in the Greek translation of the Old Testament. He is describing how the Son of God showed himself willing to be the perpetual servant of his Father and came into the world as a man.

2. Jesus understands the Father

The quotation from Psalm 40 also tells us that Jesus knew the Father’s heart as well as the Father’s will. Although he had instituted the regulations of the Mosaic covenant, with all its details about a variety of sacrifices, the Father took no pleasure in them. No matter how correct the sacrifices were according to the ritual, it was impossible that they could please God because they could not take away sin, which was his desire.

Two details, therefore, should have crossed the minds of everyone who was involved in those rituals. The first is that they should have noted that their Bible said that God took no pleasure in the rituals and they should have developed the same attitude. The second is that the quotation of Psalm 40 predicted that One would come who would do away with the need for those sacrifices. Since his readers knew that the Deliverer had come, they should not even be thinking about giving up the faith and going back to Judaism.

3. Jesus has inaugurated a new stage in God’s programme

Jesus removed the Mosaic covenant and established the new covenant. The legacy of the new covenant is that believers ‘have been sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all’ (v. 10). What does this mean? We will think about it when we get to point 7. But it is important to note that the new covenant is not administered by a mere man, as the old covenant was. Moses had no power to ensure that the old covenant would succeed. In contrast, Jesus because he is God and man does have that divine power, so he will make the new covenant a success. There will be no need for it to be replaced at any time.

4. Jesus offered a single sacrifice for sin

We have thought of this reality many times as we have made our way through the Book of Hebrews. As we think about it again, I want to make three brief points. First, what Jesus did on the cross was the greatest achievement ever done in this world, even by the Son of God. Jesus has done many wonderful things in his acts of creation and providence as he holds the universe together. Jesus dealt with the penalty of our sins, which was a far more difficult task than creating and upholding the worlds (he takes care of them by his powerful word, but it took more than that to deal with our sins.

Second, the work of Jesus in dealing with our sins was an act of atonement. It involved the shedding of his blood as a sacrifice that involved his death. One reason, I suspect, for the innumerable sacrifices that were offered in the Levitical ritual was to show to the worshippers the awfulness of what was involved in making atonement for sin. The death even of one animal is unpleasant, and who can possibly measure the repulsiveness we would feel if we saw a great number of them being killed? Yet the great number does give a small insight into what it meant for Jesus to come into this world and provide the atonement. Of course, his experience was infinitely worse because he had to endure the wrath of God.

Third, we should be full of admiration and affection towards the One who made the atonement and accomplished such an achievement. I doubt if any worshipper at the Jewish rituals ever felt admiration or affection for the animal that he offered as a sacrifice. It would be tragic if we ever descended to that ambivalence when responding to the atoning sacrifice of Jesus.

5. Jesus sat down at the right hand of God

The author tells us that after he offered his sacrifice Jesus sat down at the right hand of God. His action was in complete contrast to what the Jewish high priest did. He never sat down in the Holy of Holies in the temple. There was only one seat in the Holy of Holies – the mercy seat that depicted the throne of God. The reason why he could not sit down was twofold: first, his work was not completed and, second, he was only a man.

Jesus, however, sat down when he returned to heaven at his ascension. The reason he could sit down was because he had completed the work of atonement and it never needs to be repeated. We know that one of his sayings on the cross clearly revealed this reality. After the ordeal of the hours of darkness on the cross, he cried out with a loud voice, ‘It is finished.’ His work will never need to be repeated throughout eternity, never mind annually, as did the sacrifice of the Jewish High Priest on the Day of Atonement.

Moreover, when Jesus entered heaven he was crowned as King of kings and Lord of lords and given universal authority and power. Jesus already had universal dominion because he is divine. But at his ascension he also received this position as the Mediator who had earned it by his work of atonement. It is important to remember that there is only one throne in heaven, not two. And on that throne Jesus sits. His reward gives us insight into the stupendous achievement of the cross. So that is where he is now. But what is he doing there in heaven?

6. Jesus is waiting until all his enemies have been defeated

This statement includes a guarantee that Jesus will have complete victory. The heavenly Father is working to ensure that all those who oppose the rule of his Son will find themselves overcome and rendered powerless. Who are those enemies? Basically there are two kinds – angelic and human.

The angelic enemies are the devil and the fallen angels, and they know that they will be defeated. Several times during Jesus’ first coming they admitted this fact. That does not mean that they will not oppose what Jesus is doing. No one on earth knows how many of them there are. But they are powerless against him now, even if things around us may seem to give another impression.

The human enemies are unregenerate sinners and they can oppose Jesus in different ways. We live in a time when and a place where they are very active. They can use all kinds of terminology to describe what they are doing, but the clear matter in which they are engaged is opposition to the kingdom of Jesus. But such a situation is nothing new for Christ’s church. In many times and places such opposition has been the norm. The enemies can be political or religious; they can be intellectual or pleasure loving; they can be old or young; they can be male or female; they can be rich or poor; they can be upright or unreliable.

Of course, the big difference between both sets of enemies is that mercy is offered to the human opponents of Jesus, no matter what they have done against him. When we think of the church, this is its outward focus. The church looks in many directions: it looks up to God with worship; it looks inside to one another with care; and it looks out to the world with the offer of mercy from its King.

One day, the period in which mercy is offered will come to an end. On that day, as the quotation from Psalm 110 indicates, all his impenitent enemies will become the footstool for his feet. This is a very graphic illustration of how complete the victory of Jesus will be. He will crush those who persist in rebelling against him when he comes to judge the world.

7. Jesus has perfected his people forever

What does the writer mean by ‘perfected’? He cannot be referring to the perfection that they will know in the eternal state because they have not yet been glorified. Instead he is referring to a perfection they currently possess. One way to understand this perfection is to consider what was imperfect about the Jewish high priest and his work. It was imperfect in that he could not provide ongoing pardon and peace for those he represented. In contrast, Jesus provides such perfection for his people. We can say that he provides them with pardon, peace and a place.

His offering on the cross paid the penalty for their sins. When they come to trust in him, they discover that they have the status of being at peace with God and can enjoy subjective peace from God in their hearts. Moreover they find that they have permanent access to the presence of God – this is what is meant by the description ‘sanctified’ in verse 14. Sanctification here does not refer to the inner change that a believer experiences. Instead it means that we can remain in God’s presence because of the offering of Jesus.

So we have seen from this passage seven marvellous details connected to Jesus. We may wonder why those Hebrew Christians were tempted to give up. The reason was that they had taken their eyes of him and having done so had lost their vision. The same happens to us when we take our eyes of Jesus.